Archive for November, 2009

Jeremy Finkelstein took the Rolling Stones’ Angie — a boring old song — and made it exciting and new by speeding up Mick Jagger’s voice and adding the sound of gun shots. Pour this pleasure down your earhole:

I like living in New York but some things about New Yorkers bug me. Here are ten of those things:

1. They stand in the street while waiting to cross. That extra second they’re saving by standing in the street, where the cars ARE, rather than on the sidewalk, where they AREN’T, is worthless. There is a reason we as humans separate the sidewalk from the street. New Yorkers don’t seem to get it.

2. They are information one-uppers. New Yorkers treat information as a test. Tell them something and they will need to prove that they know more about that thing than you do. E.g., “I found a great pizza place on Bleecker.” “Oh yeah? The place you really need to go to is on Spring.”

3. They say “on line” instead of “in line.” “In line” makes sense — people in a queue have formed a shape roughly similar to a line. But “on line?” Where is this line? Why are we standing on it?

4. They think their city has the best hot dogs. The typical New York hot dog is a thin, boiled gray weiner that has been sitting in stale water for hours. The predominant flavor is whatever condiment you put on it. The “snap” sound that occurs when you bite into the casing is supposed to be a big draw. But shouldn’t taste be paramount when it comes to judging food? Honestly, Toronto street dogs, for example — grilled, big, juicy, with a wide array of condiments — kick the crap out of New York’s puny boiled logs of blandness.

5. They think everyone else is dumb. Unless you are from London, Paris, or Tokyo, New Yorkers will not treat your opinion about “cool” or, really, anything cultural as not worth listening to. New Yorkers know everything and they knew it before you did.

6. They are everywhere. If you want to watch a movie for free in a public park, you will have to get there hours early and compete for blanket space with ten thousand other people. If you want to eat brunch at a quaint neighborhood restaurant, you must be prepared to wait 45 minutes for a table because everyone else in your neighborhood wants to do the same thing. If you want to take a Sunday afternoon tour of an abandoned train station in downtown Brooklyn, you must expect to be joined by hundreds of others. For such a knowing group of people, they don’t seem to have much inside information.

7. They always blame someone else for ‘ruining a place.’ Despite having read about all the same places on Brownstoner, or, more likely, in Time Out New York, every New Yorker will blame every other New Yorker for finding out about some “cool” spot and then having the gall to show up there, thus ruining it.

8. They are insufferably nostalgic for things they do not actually want to re-experience. Bushwick before the hipsters moved in. Union Square when it was a drug zone. Park Slope before the yuppies. Scratch a New Yorker when they’re reminiscing about this kind of stuff and you will find someone who is sad about getting older — not someone who actually wants to be mugged on the subway just like they were in 1977.

9. They take walking personally. Sometimes people walk slower than other people! The nerve!

10. They live in New York. If they didn’t, I get could a table at that great restaurant without having to wait on line and it would be just like it was back in the early ’00s. Now get out of my way!

Mind’s Eye- I know it’s technically two words, but that doesn’t make it any better. Mind’s eye? I picture an eyeball situated in the middle of a brain. An unpleasing image to say the least. Harrumph, indeed!

Cozy- I distinctly remember my babysitter back in my yoot asking me if I was ‘cozy’ in my crib. I said, ‘sure’, but really? Read between the lines, woman. That baby wanted to kick you. That baby was me.

Whatnot- Do me a favour and never finish your sentence with this one. Better you say, ‘etc’ or ‘and so on’. Actually, if you pronounce it as “chwhatnot”, I’m cool with it.

Blog- What the hell is a blog, anyway? Log mixed with the letter B? I get the log part, but the extraneous B just drives me nuts. And the fact that it drives me nuts, in fact, means I’m nuts.

You- You’re a dumb word.

Can’t believe you fell for that one. And now the part where I use all the words I despise in a sentence: Last night while I was getting cozy with you, my mind’s eye was really dwelling on my next blog entry, and whatnot. Sorry, Guinevere. I was only pretending to listen.

I needed my suit dry-cleaned this morning. Tonight, I am attending a black-tie preferred event, and my one bit of formal wear’s gotta look spiffy. Tonight, my rumpled Gary Leeman pajamas (Flames, not Leafs, duh) simply don’t cut it. So off I was, expecting to find a full-serve dry cleanery with the capes (ability) to wash and clean my 3 piece Calvin Klien (not a typo, but a knock-off) of the cat-hair it has accumulated since its last scrubbing. But no, in my 17 minute walk to work, roughly 1.5 miles of Toronto’s most densely populated commercial strip, not a single dry cleaner. I decided to venture underground, where it’s more smoke shops and beef patties, than the above ground fare of Louis Vuitton, and other rich dick vendors. It’s here where I found the reliable dry-cleaner that I had been seeking. Much to my chagrin (a stupid saying if I’ve ever heard one), the shopkeep had stepped out. In lieu, a sign saying he’d be back in 5. Five minutes later, at 10am, I returned and inquired about their same day service. The cleaner, who I presume runs the place, tells me that my request for same-day has to be filed before 10, thus he will not be able to have my suit ready until the next morning. Aw zoodles! His exact words were a little less flowery: “no, no, you go, impossible, time bad”. Off to the next dry cleaner. This time, the lady-shopkeep said that they can’t have it ready by day’s end, so I asked if she knew of another place that could get it done. Without any sense of irony or sarcasm, this was our exchange:

Me: Do you know of a place that can get this done?

Her: Yes, behind building. There. (she didn’t point in any direction)

Me: Ok, um, where again?

Her: You go there.

Me: Where?

Her: Yes, right there.

Me: Ok, I’ll go to there. Thanks.

And this proves my point that I can blog about anything and you will read it. Sucker.

Yesterday I was on my way to a Thanksgiving dinner when I got a text message. I didn’t recognize the number. The message read, “Happy Thanksgiving. It’s [name redacted]. Am working today. If you need anything call me.”

I took a walk north on my street this evening. Along the way I passed a man staring at me through a 7-foot tall iron fence. He was in his mid 70s, smoking a cigarette, his head was slumped, he was missing a leg and sitting in a wheelchair. Behind him, the yard was dotted by dozens more people just like this guy. I bet this picture wasn’t included in the brochure for “Leisure World”.

Just now, when I went to go get my morning cop of joe, I almost got hit by a car. I was walking in-between two parked cars when one of them started to back-up. It stopped about six inches from crushing my legs. The incident reminded me of the time I almost killed three people while driving in Tennessee.

But more about that later. Here’s something that’s been flipping my noodle lately: Whenever I clean my apartment, how come it seems that a solid 80% of the hair on the floor is pubie hair? So many short and curlies, so few long and straights. The sheer amount of S&Cs is strange to me. You’d think MPB (male pubic baldness) would be an issue, but no — the boosh is as lush as ever. I don’t understand it. But if scientists could harness the hairy power of Talvid’s nether regions, could they cure baldness? Alopecia? The possibilities are endless.

Just for reference sake, here are some people who I’ve been told I look like:

Late last night I met up with a girl who I know, sadly, from only having played online scrabble with. Not necessarily a date, not necessarily a friendly thing either. I knew the night would either end in a forced game of actual scrabble, or straight up 69ing. It’s just how 21st century kids roll. I digress. After an hour or two of perfectly normal conversation, ranging from Donkey Rabies, to the little red clitoris mouse found mostly in the centre of more antiquated IBM Thinkpad keyboards, we decided to take off. Stepping outside of the bar, we were instantly approached by a taller than myself, thinner than myself, more mustached than myself hipster with a whole ballsack full of nerve. What he did next, was a date-killing first: First, he tapped my friend on the shoulder and apologized for interrupting us. In a friendly way, I told him to “beat-it, buster, before I make a lady outta you, see?” To this, he paid no mind and proceeded to ask my date if, by chance, she had a light for his cigarette. She obliged him. Gratefully, he accepted her Bic lighter and lit his smoke. Upon passing it back to her, in addition to the fire, he passed her a note, turned around, and head west on College St. My guess, he was late for band practice. Here’s what it said:

Hey Beautiful Stranger,

You seem really cool and somewhat Bored by what I think is a date. If you would like to ever grab a coffee, or a drink shoot me off an email. The art of the letter is Dead.
-Tim (Random guy eavesdropping) (sorry btw)
P.S. I mean you seem really, really cool.
Tpops@gmail.com

Kinda weird how calling a bro from England an Englishman is cool, but calling a fella from China a Chinaman is bad mojo. I watched a Boris Karloff movie recently where he played Fu Manchu, a Chinaman Chinese supervillain. It was pretty dope. Reminded me in a way of the restaurant below:

After I watched the movie, I was relaxing by thinking of haikus and playing a bamboo flute when I got hungry. I went to the place below for some chicken balls with sweet and sour sauce. The color of that shit is amazing. I’m pretty picky about my Chinese food. I only like it real authentic-like. If you’re also picky about chinese food — i.e., don’t wanna settle for Manchu Wok or Mandarin — I suggest you try the place you’re about to feast your eyes on. Tell ’em I sent you. And try the plain scallions (that’s a kind of vegetable).

I’m pretty much a foodie. I fucking eat food all the time. But check this out: you know how most people will like get their baloney sammy and just scarf that shit? I fucking dress it up with mayo and mustard and whatnot. Same goes for Chinese food. Most people just order it in or go to a buffet. I’m such a fucking foodie that I only go places where the servers DRESS authentic-style. Like the place below. I suggest you try it (if you think your palate can handle stuff like Chicken Balls with Sweet and Sour sauce and Egg Rolls with plum sauce and won-tons [those are like Chinese raviolys]).!